Warning - SKY £75 Pay Once Watch Forever problems

adiohead

Hi,

I got the "pay once watch forever" deal August last year.

I cancelled my subscription within 3 months and after the 4th I received just the free-to-air channels.

BUT, in the last month I have lost 5, e4, e4+1, more4, fiver, fiveusa.

I phoned sky and they want £20 from me for a freesat card.

I still get more+1 though

What's the deal with this?
There's nothing on the freesatfromsky website about them wanting another £20 at a random time in the future.

NonGeographicalMan

adiohead wrote: »

I got the "pay once watch forever" deal August last year.

I cancelled my subscription within 3 months and after the 4th I received just the free-to-air channels.

BUT, in the last month I have lost 5, e4, e4+1, more4, fiver, fiveusa.

e4, e4+1 and more4 do not require a viewing card in the slot in the Sky box to receive them as they are not encrypted. Your box's software may have partially crashed in some way so I would suggest powering it off at the mains plug for five minutes then starting it up again. My mother lost viewing of these channels on her Sky Pay Once Watch Forever box (long desubscribed but she leaves it on 24/7 and does not have Auto Standby enabled) till it was power cycled in this way. Failing that try retuning the box by pressing the Services Button then selecting the System Setup menu then press the "0" "1" and "Select" keys in that order and select New Installation at the resulting Installer menu. You then need to accept the signal strength etc and have a phone line attached to complete the channel rescan process. Sky accepts New Install calls even for unsubscribed boxes.

I phoned sky and they want £20 from me for a freesat card.

I still get more+1 though

What's the deal with this?

There's nothing on the freesatfromsky website about them wanting another £20 at a random time in the future.

But the Freesat From Sky website does on the other hand make it very clear Sky will send you a new viewing card if required (to go on getting the FTV channels) free of charge in the first five years. They should be sending these out shortly so that you can go on viewing Sky3, Five USA and Fiver as they are replacing their Blue Yellow House viewing cards with new white viewing cards and will switch off the old Blue cards for getting Sky 3, Fiver and Five USA by year end.

See https://www.freesatfromsky.co.uk/terms-pay-once.aspx

Equipment: You can receive a free standard Sky box without subscribing to Sky digital or taking up this pack. Sky selects your equipment. Free Sky box must be connected to a telephone line for 12 months. Warranty is against faults arising in first 12 months and does not affect your statutory rights. Charges may apply after end of warranty period. If we re-issue viewing cards within 5 years, replacements supplied free of charge, otherwise charges may apply.

Having said that my mum has not yet been sent a new viewing card by Sky yet and her install was only 20 months ago. I expect Sky may in reality have to be prodded by customers to honour their commitments to send out these free replacement viewing cards to Sky Pay Once Watch Forever customers. No doubt they hope to con unwitting customers in to believing they have to subscribe to Sky again or pay them a one off fee to get a replacement viewing card.:mad:

Mancunian

my mum hasnt had her new viewing card yet and she is still a subscriber, so still time.

adiohead

NonGeographicalMan wrote: »

e4, e4+1 and more4 do not require a viewing card in the slot in the Sky box to receive them as they are not encrypted. Your box's software may have partially crashed in some way so I would suggest powering it off at the mains plug for five minutes then starting it up again. My mother lost viewing of these channels on her Sky Pay Once Watch Forever box (long desubscribed but she leaves it on 24/7 and does not have Auto Standby enabled) till it was power cycled in this way. Failing that try retuning the box by pressing the Services Button then selecting the System Setup menu then press the "0" "1" and "Select" keys in that order and select New Installation at the resulting Installer menu. You then need to accept the signal strength etc and have a phone line attached to complete the channel rescan process. Sky accepts New Install calls even for unsubscribed boxes.

thanks for the replies

i have tried doing a forced update but to no avail. havn't tried the new install method because we don't have a phone line (paid the £25 no phone line fee).

i guess it could be the card but then i should still get e4 & more4 without it.

get the feeling i'm going to have to complain with customer services. :rolleyes:

adiohead

Mancunian wrote: »

e4 and More4 arent free on FreeSAT

when i take the viewing card out of my parents receiver i can still get e4 and more4.

but FIVE, fiver, etc all say "insert viewing card"

on my box i can get more+1 and sky3.

weird.

OldGreyFox

E4 and More4 are available see: http://www.freesatfromsky.co.uk/freesat-tv-choice.aspx

NonGeographicalMan

adiohead wrote: »

when i take the viewing card out of my parents receiver i can still get e4 and more4

I thought you said in post #203 that you had lost access to these channels. Or was that on your Sky box and not your parents box?

but FIVE, fiver, etc all say "insert viewing card"

Yes they will do because they are still FTV (Free to View) and not FTA (Free to Air) so are encrypted and need a valid Sky viewing card to decrypt them, even though you do not need to be paying Sky a sub (the same is true of Sky Three). The version of Five now available on Freesat is being transmitted from Astra 2D, unlike the one available on Sky Digiboxes from the Sky EPG (you can get the FTA Freesat version on a Sky box using the Add Channels function but not using the Sky EPG), so does not need to be encrypted to restrict its footprint to the UK unless you have an absolutely massive 3m dish in somewhere like Southern Spain. Fiver and Five USA cannot afford to be on Astra 2D as there is a lack of channel space on that transmitter and they cannot afford to pay the premium required to be transmitted on it and hence it is cheaper for them to restrict accesss to only UK residents by using Sky's FTV encryption system. These problems with transmission area and access rights do not exist over on Freeview and hence the channels are FTA there,

on my box i can get more+1 and sky3.

The fact you can get Sky 3 shows that your Sky viewing card is active to receive FTV channels as Sky 3 is also FTV like Fiver and Five USA.

Have you restored the firmware on your Sky box to the latest available version by pulling the power plug then holding down the Backup key on the front of the Sky box itself and then reconnecting the power while still holding down the Backup key on the Sky box until you get a message on a black screen with white text saying new firmware is being downloaded? The firmware then takes 10 minutes to download and install.

adiohead

NonGeographicalMan wrote: »

I thought you said in post #203 that you had lost access to these channels. Or was that on your Sky box and not your parents box?

sorry, might have confused things. i have lost the channels on my sky box and tried out my parents one to see if E4 and more4 were FTA.

The fact you can get Sky 3 shows that your Sky viewing card is active to receive FTV channels as Sky 3 is also FTV like Fiver and Five USA.

Have you restored the firmware on your Sky box to the latest available version by pulling the power plug then holding down the Backup key on the front of the Sky box itself and then reconnecting the power while still holding down the Backup key on the Sky box until you get a message on a black screen with white text saying new firmware is being downloaded? The firmware then takes 10 minutes to download and install.

thanks, i did try this yesterday but still no luck (i tried twice).
i will phone sky again and explain that there must be a fault because i can't get E4 and more4 when they should work without a viewing card.

on my box they just say "no satellite signal" and not "insert card" like on my parents.


thanks for the help. will have to argue it out with sky because the rude woman was adamant that i should pay a further £20.

NonGeographicalMan

adiohead wrote: »

on my box they just say "no satellite signal" and not "insert card" like on my parents.

That in theory implies that your Sky box is not getting a good enough signal on these particular Sky frequencies. However as these channels are broadcast from an Astra satellite and not from Eurobird (as minority FTA channels like Movies4Men, Euronews and World Movies are) this would normally be very unusual. Normally if you have tree branches etc in the way of your signal it is always the Eurobird transmitted channels that suffer first.

I would therefore still suggest invoking the New Install menu by pressing 0 1 Select in the System Services menu. So far as I know the retune process still completes even if the box can't make its call back to Sky because you don't have a phone line attached. It seems to me the box has become confused about the tuned channels for some reason and needs the channels rescanned and stored.

thanks for the help. will have to argue it out with sky because the rude woman was adamant that i should pay a further £20.

The £20 business for a new viewing card is a nonsense since we have established a viewing card is not required to receive these channels and also they are not allowed to charge you for a replacement viewing card in the first five years assuming you have not broken the viewing card through deliberate customer vandalism.

Also note that Sky Pay Once Watch Forever equipment and dish is guaranteed for one year as clearly stated in the Pay Once Watch Forever terms and conditions but Sky's lieing customer service staff will try to suggest if you have already desubscribed they do not have to maintain the equipment under the 12 month warranty. This is a typical shoddy Sky tactic to try to con money out of customers who do not need to pay them any money. Once you realise that Sky are a bunch of dishonest wideboys then you understand the company much, much better!

If you continue to get any more nonsense from them send an email to jeremy.darroch@bskyb.com with cc to crsupport@bskyb.com and matters should then be rectified. If they send out an engineer to fix the problem and the install is less than 12 months old you do not have to pay for the call out but you will have to insist on your rights and refer them to the terms and conditions for Sky Pay Once Watch Forever to make sure of this.:eek::mad:

adiohead

thanks NonGeographicalMan
i tried a new installation (twice) but that didn't work either

still getting "no satellite signal" on FIVE, E4, E4+1, More4, FIVER, FIVER+1, FIVEusa & FIVEusa+1

but can get sky3 and more4+1 no problem.

looks like i'll have to call sky or the satellite fitter man.